nearer to the high plain.  He arrived at the bank about sunset, having gone only six miles in a direct course from the canoes:  but he saw no traces of the men, nor did he receive any answer to his shouts nor the firing of his gun.  It was now nearly dark; a duck lighted near him and he shot it.  He then went on the head of a small island where he found some driftwood, which enabled him to cook his duck for supper, and he laid down to sleep on some willow brush.  The night was cool, but the driftwood gave him a good fire, and he suffered no inconvenience except from the mosquitoes.

Wednesday 31.  The next morning he waited till after seven o’clock, when he became uneasy lest we should have gone beyond his camp last evening and determined to follow us.  Just as he had set out with this intention, he saw one of the party in advance of the canoes; although our camp was only two miles below him, in a straight line, we could not reach him sooner, in consequence of the rapidity of the water and the circuitous course of the river.  We halted for breakfast, after which captain Lewis continued his route.  At the distance of one mile from our encampment we passed the principal entrance of a stream on the left, which rises in the snowy mountains to the southwest, between Jefferson and Madison rivers, and discharges itself by seven mouths, five below, and one three miles above this, which is the largest, and about thirty yards wide:  we called it Philosophy river.  The water of it is abundant and perfectly clear, and the bed like that of the Jefferson consists of pebble and gravel.  There is some timber in the bottoms of the river, and vast numbers of otter and beaver, which build on its smaller mouths and the bayous of its neighbourhood.  The Jefferson continues as yesterday, shoaly and rapid, but as the islands though numerous are small, it is however more collected into one current than it was below, and is from ninety to one hundred and twenty yards in width.  The low ground has a fertile soil of rich black loam, and contains a considerable quantity of timber, with the bullrush and cattail flag very abundant in the moist parts, while the drier situations are covered with fine grass, tansy, thistles, onions, and flax.  The uplands are barren, and without timber:  the soil is a light yellow clay intermixed with small smooth pebble and gravel, and the only produce is the prickly-pear, the sedge, and the bearded grass, which is as dry and inflammable as tinder.  As we proceeded the low grounds became narrower, and the timber more scarce, till at the distance of ten miles the high hills approach and overhang the river on both sides, forming cliffs of a hard black granite, like almost all those below the limestone cliffs at the three forks of the Missouri:  they continue so for a mile and three quarters, where we came to a point of rock on the right side, at which place the hills again retire, and the valley widens to the distance of a mile and a half.  Within